Monrovia delays public hearing on $40M land deal for Gold Line yard

MONROVIA - Amid allegations of a lack of transparency, the City Council delayed a public hearing Tuesday on a proposed $39.6 million land sale for a maintenance and operations facility for the Metro Gold Line Foothill Extension project.

The proposed sale of 14 acres of redevelopment agency land to the Metro Gold Line Foothill Extension Construction Authority was set to be debated at the special hearing Tuesday, a move strongly criticized by Councilman Tom Adams.

City officials had said the matter was urgent because the state could move to eliminate local redevelopment agencies in the coming days.

But City Manager Scott Ochoa unexpectedly asked the item be delayed, and the council continued the hearing until the April 5 council meeting.

"We have today a document that we are satisfied with, that we believe reflects what the transaction could be and should be in the eyes of Monrovia, but we have not at this point gotten a reciprocal sense from the Gold Line Construction Authority that they, too, are comfortable" with it, Ochoa said.

In a letter sent to the city clerk and local media, Adams, who could not attend the special meeting, blasted the meeting and questioned the wisdom of the land deal.

"I know we are told there is danger, danger that the state could take away this land and block the Gold Line from coming," he wrote in the letter, which was read aloud by the city clerk Tuesday. "I would rather risk what the state could do than rush this through in an off cycle meeting in an inconvenient time that seems to be less than transparent."

Adams, who is vying for re-election next month, also lamented the fact that once the property is transferred to the Gold Line, it would "never again generate tax revenue."

"Mr. Adams' letter refers to this special meeting as `rushed' and even comments that the proceedings, in his opinion, are less than transparent," she said. "He seems to divorce himself from the fact that he has been a party to all of the Council discussions leading to this point."

City officials say they've been negotiating the deal's terms with the Metro Gold Line Foothill Extension Construction Authority (GLCA) and the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) for several months.

Once GLCA manages the design and construction of the foothill extension, Metro will operate and maintain the extension, which will add six light rail stations in the cities of Arcadia, Monrovia, Duarte, Irwindale and Azusa.

While the deal was slated to be approved first by Metro, then by the GLCA and ultimately the city, Monrovia officials were asked by GLCA to consider the deal sooner in light of potential action by the state legislature to eliminate redevelopment agencies, Lutz said before the meeting.

"We've been asked to do this now before Metro does the approval so we can lock it in, so the state cannot take this property from our redevelopment agency, which would jeopardize the Gold Line light rail system for the whole line," she said.

Earlier Tuesday, Ochoa said the proposed land deal met all of the city's goals it had during its negotiations.

The proposed deal would expedite the construction of the Gold Line extension, hold Monrovia harmless financially and mitigate any and all environmental impacts, he said.

The property is part of the Station Square project area, a massive mixed commercial and residential project that will accompany the Monrovia Gold Line station near the intersection of West Duarte Road and South Myrtle Avenue.